Commercial poultry processing involves the steps of taking whole poultry, such as chicken, turkey, duck, goose, and the like, and systematically cleaning, separating and deboning the various parts of the poultry for subsequent packaging or cooking.
Improvements to speed, sanitation and safety measures in poultry processing have led to very high processed poultry production rates. However, with high production rates, it is important to be able to provide consistent poultry products efficiently, avoiding excess waste or extended line down time.
Variations in poultry processing lines also require that the equipment used be flexible and able to accommodate different transfer and conveyance systems between operations. The ability to provide for continuous processing is also advantageous, but must be balanced with the need to provide consistent products.
Traditional “front half” poultry processing involves loading the front half, which is the poultry portion including the ribcage, tenders, breasts and wings, onto some sort of conveyance device. An example is a vertical cone-shaped apparatus, onto which each front half is manually loaded by its chest cavity in an upward vertical position for further processing involving manually cutting the wings and/or breast portion from the front half. Another example, such as described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,648,144, conveys the poultry front half in a horizontal position to cut and remove the wing and breast portions from the front half.
While such front half processing has been used for many years, there remains a need for improving the manual loading process, reducing variability in cutting the front half shoulder section or joint, and providing for efficient continuous motion in front half poultry processing. In particular, a need exists to accommodate for the variability in poultry front half sizes and dimensions while reducing product loss associated with multiple transfer operations.